Page 68 of The Summers of Us

But he was real, standing next to me in the sand, shoulders slumped. His hair was longer than I remembered, messier, but still swept around like it had been at Kelsie’s last summer.

“Holden.”

He sat next to me, his words slurred. “Are you drunk?”

“A little. Beer. You?”

“Some beer, some of my dad’s tequila.” He placed a bottle of tequila in the sand. “Let’s add it to the list of reasons he’ll want to kill me.”

I picked up the bottle. A cool breeze hit the glass and lit my fingers up. I flooded my mouth with stale tequila, let it burn a trail down my throat. It tasted like nail polish remover. I almost vomited, but I exhaled steadily to ride out the feeling. I should have taken it as a sign to stop, but I took another large swig, barely leaving time to swallow before more streamed in. It made the pain more bearable, but I didn’t know which pain I was trying to mask.

“Save some for me.” He took a sip so large I was sure he was going to lose his stomach on the sand. The distant fire lit up his glossed-over eyes and the heartache brewing inside them. “Mason’s with Luke again.”

I couldn’t blame the crack in his voice on the tequila. “I’m sorry.”

The air fell silent between two drunk teenagers living inside their own drunk minds. What would Holden have thought if he could read the thoughts plinking in my mind? Everett had moved on from me. He and Kelsie kissed by the fire. He unknowingly broke my heart, and I deserved every bit of it.

Holden looked at me again. “I wish I had a shooting star to wish on.”

“What would you wish for?”

“You want the truth or a joke?”

“The truth,” I said without thinking.

“Acceptance.” It was a whisper drowned out by the crickets and the distant roar of the fire and everyone around it. “You?”

I knew he wanted the truth. My truth wasn’t that hard to conjure. I shrugged. “Trust. Let’s find us a shooting star.”

We didn’t find any shooting stars. The stars knew when people wanted them and stayed still in defiance. All the sky sent us were airplane headlights and swirly, twinkling stars. Constellations teased their horoscopes like unattainable prizes, but they didn’t give good horoscopes to people that didn’t recognize them.

I didn’t know how much I’d had to drink.

Holden left not long after the fruitless shooting star search. I didn’t know where he went, but I hoped maybe he didn’t need a shooting star after all.

I made my way across the yard. I didn’t know where I was going. The world spun around me. It was like I was in the fun house at the Boardwalk. One tiny shift threw the whole reflection off balance. I could fall asleep in the middle of this crowd. Someone would catch me. I could run into the crowd and start a line dance. Someone would follow. I could run through the fire and make it across without catching it. Run across coals and it wouldn’t even hurt. Ride Tsunami and feel on top of the world.

I wanted to disappear.

I wanted to shout for everyone to hear.

Partygoers sauntered around me like I was going the wrong way down a one-way street. They danced, tossed their heads back, glowed in the string lights that were now a wet, streaky windshield,blurry across the whole yard.

Haven and Chance were by the fire. At least, I thought it was them. She leaned into him, her neck craned for his sloppy, blurry kisses. Her rollercoaster had rolled backwards. She’d thrown everything away for the boy who stopped her momentum in the first place.

She probably knew more than me about romance, but I knew more than her about how to stay safe on a rollercoaster. I knew more about precaution and security, even if that meant she knew more about happiness. I didn’t know which fate was worse. I didn’t know if my caution and security had run off anyway, leaving me with nothing.

Everett and Kelsie weren’t in the chair by the fire anymore. They were probably long gone now, riding a rollercoaster somewhere far from here.

On the way inside to the bathroom—thatwaswhere I was going—I ran into a guy. Or he ran into me? I didn’t know. I didn’t care. He was really hot. Instead of ignoring me, he looked at me and smiled.

“You wanna dance?” he shouted over the music. His hair was the color of coffee beans. His teeth glinted in the firelight. “Name’s Charlie.”

Sounded fun. I nodded. “Quinn.”

I was still nodding when he wrapped his arms around my waist. Slow, sleepy nods.Stop nodding. Perk up. Half a second later, maybe even a whole second, his hands made sense of my waist. They inched up above my chest. Tickled at my neck.

His cheeks were red from the heat, from the dancing he’d clearly been doing all night. The alcohol I smelled on his breath. Red was my favorite color. Heat. The color I saw through my eyelids when I sank into the feeling. Golden-red. Flames.

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